Quantitative investigation of inappropriate regression model construction and the importance of medical statistics experts in observational medical research: a cross-sectional study.

Objective: To investigate under what circumstances inappropriate use of 'multivariate analysis' is likely to occur and to identify the population that needs more support with medical statistics.

Study Design And Settings: The frequency of inappropriate regression model construction in multivariate analysis and related factors were investigated in observational medical research publications.

Results: The inappropriate algorithm of using only variables that were significant in univariate analysis was estimated to occur at 6.

The socioeconomic within-gender gap in informal caregiving among middle-aged women: Evidence from a Japanese nationwide survey.

Caregiving to older people with needs has been mainly dependent on informal care provision by female caregivers. Compared with the care burden gender gap, the within-gender gap in women's socioeconomic status (SES) has attracted less policy attention. We investigated the association between middle-aged women's SES and the likelihood of being a primary caregiver for elderly informal care, focusing on household income, women's marital status, work status, and educational background under the universal and public system of formal long-term care provision in Japan.

A gap in formal long-term care use related to characteristics of caregivers and households, under the public universal system in Japan: 2001-2010.

We investigated whether the universal provision of long-term care (LTC) under Japan's public system has equalized its use across households with different socio-economic characteristics, with a special focus on the gender and marital status of primary caregivers, and income. We used repeated cross-sectional data from national household surveys (2001, 2004, 2007, and 2010) and conducted multiple logistic regression analyses to obtain odds ratios of caregiver and household characteristics for service use, adjusting for recipients' characteristics. The results showed that the patterns of service use have been consistently determined by caregivers' gender and marital status over the period despite demographic changes among caregivers.

Factors affecting the entry of for-profit providers into a price regulated market for formal long-term care services: a case study from Japan.

While the distinct behaviors of for-profit and non-profit providers in the healthcare market have been compared in the economic literature, their choices regarding market entry and exit have only recently been debated. Since 2000, when public Long-Term Care Insurance was introduced in Japan, for-profit providers have been able to provide formal long-term homecare services. The aim of this study is to determine which factors have affected market entry of for-profit providers under price regulation and in competition with existing non-profit providers.